Federal Judge Orders DACA to Continue, Accept New Applicants

In the strongest blow yet to the Trump administration’s effort to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA), a federal judge in Washington ordered the Trump administration to resume accepting both new and renewal applications starting in 90 days if it can’t provide a justification to end the program.

US District Judge John Bates said the government’s decision to end the program was “virtually unexplained” and therefore “unlawful.” He ordered the program to resume and then stayed his order for 90 days, allowing the administration to provide more legal justification to end the program.

In his ruling, Bates called the decision to end the program “arbitrary and capricious” and noted that the government “failed to adequately explain its conclusion that the program was unlawful.”

If the government can’t provide a better explanation for its opinion that the program is unlawful, the Department of Homeland Security “must accept and process new as well as renewal DACA applications.”